


I'd give my all to run away with you again

by Nex_Jen



Category: All Elite Wrestling, Professional Wrestling, World Wrestling Entertainment, 新日本プロレス | New Japan Pro-Wrestling
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, M/M, Many wrestling cameos, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-19
Updated: 2020-01-03
Packaged: 2020-09-23 13:42:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20341048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nex_Jen/pseuds/Nex_Jen
Summary: Roman's journey to find his husband leads him down a murky path navigating through the world's supernatural underbelly.





	1. Prologue

Dean stared at his wallet.

He knew what he was doing, the life he held would soon become a burden. The Anoa'i family loved him, accepted him, but where would he be once his link to them was gone? There was nothing left for him back in Cincinnati, his mom overdosed a few years back and his sister ran off with some tattooed emo.

Even if they were still around, nothing felt right without Roman, a world without Roman was one he couldn't imagine, didn't want to. He couldn't imagine staying in Pensacola without Roman.

He kept the business card just in case, a thread to the unreal he would always be plagued with. The darkness he'd known and could never expel. All he would need to do is fulfill a dirty deed with a little bit of ink.

His skin crawled thinking about it, signing himself away. But for Roman, for Roman even the world wouldn't be enough. He would give up what he is, what he was, and all that he'd hope to be for Roman.

He pulled out a black business card and dialed the number.


	2. Where do I start?

The pips and beeps of his heart monitor, the drip of IV fluid, sound tickling his ears while the cold chlorine tang of hospital smell assaults his nose.

Bright sunlight stings Roman's eyes as they struggle to flutter open. Slowly his eyes focus revealing the image of a pale room streaked with off-white paint, stale and impersonal with only a navy blue curtain dangling beside the room's window providing him a semblance of color. A hospital room, his eyes roam towards his left where an empty black chair mocks him. No leather jacket perched atop it, no sign of recent use, it just sat there, empty.

One nagging prevailing thought permeates his mind, w_here's Dean?_

All at once sensation bleeds into him, jolting him further awake. Overcome by the sudden overwhelming sensations he becomes more aware of the chill of hospital air conditioning prickling his skin, breeding goosebumps across his body.

_ Dean? Dean? Where's Dean? _

He'd fallen deeply asleep after his last allograft session hadn't he? Dean was there. Where's he now?

"Dean. Dean. Dean." Roman's chap lips repeat while his body trembles, the chill, the smell, the sounds, the lighting, it was all too much, too soon. _Where's Dean?_

"Dean. Dean! DEAN!"

A new beeping, like a siren, a flashing red light, and then a frantic blonde nurse.

"Mr. Anoa'i!!!"

She held his arms down, Roman couldn't concentrate on escaping her grasp. He felt like he was drowning, struggling to capture air.

"Mr. Anoa'i please calm down! You're safe." The petite blonde nurse at his side he know her, _Alexa right?_

"Mr Anoa'i, you're having a panic attack, please breathe with me." 

_Breathe. That's what I need to do, Breathe._

"Nikki, call his family please, Mr. Anoa'i has woken up."

_Another woman, when did she arrive?_

"Mr Anoa'i, breathe with me."

So he did, tuning his attention to her words, breathing in cadence with her. The blips of the beeping siren stopped.

The blonde nurse comforted him. "Better Mr. Anoa'i, your family will be here soon if you need anything don't be afraid to press for an emergency and call us." The blonde nurse consoled him.

"Roman. Please call me Roman. Mr. Anoa'i makes me think of my dad." He chuckled.

Her lips twisted into a genuine bright smile. "Roman, again call us for anything you need Nikki and I, Nurse Bliss, are on call today."

◇◇◇◇◇

Vacantly, Roman gazes at the television screen, some mindless childrens cartoon distracting him as he awaits his missing family.

A creaking noise drew Roman's attention to his right, towards the hospital room door. Upon opening the other nurse, a pale brunette woman with a Scottish accent appears with an unexpected pair of familiar faces besides her, Jimmy and Jey.

"Uce!" A faint smile curls across Roman's lips, happy to see his cousins.

"I'll leave you three alone so we can call Dr. Michaels." The petite Scottish woman announced.

"Ok." Roman responded.

Jimmy yelled, "Uce, you're awake we're all worried about you fam!"

"It was freaky you just never woke up after the anaesthesia." Jey continued as he strode to take a seat on the vacant leather chair.

"Where's Dean?" Roman asked, concerned about his missing husband. Jimmy's and Jey's faces pale before his eyes before they quickly compose themselves eyeing each other in a way that only made sense as one of their telepathic twin conversations.

To his right, Jey grasps Roman's hand rubbing soothing circles along his knuckles in an attempt to comfort him before replying, "Uce, one night Dean texted us to look over you 'cause he needed to do a shift for work and then he just disappeared."

"No one can find him. We kept calling and he never answered. We thought maybe his phone battery died." Jimmy added. 

"What?" _that can't be right_, "When was this?" Roman pleaded.

"Tuesday, like 2 days ago or something hasn't been that long. Haven't caught him at your place and he's still not answering his phone." Jey answered. 

Fear arrose within Roman. _What happened? He wouldn't leave like that, none of this can be true can it? Is this why I feel like he's gone?_

Sensing his cousin's fear, Jimmy attempts to calm his cousin. "I'm sure he's alright uce if anything we'll go kick his ass for ditching you and not coming back."

Roman doubts Dean would abandon him and even though Dean had always been a private person, he was never one to leave a message unanswered, at least not from a family member. It didn't feel right.

"Yeah, come on man you have enough stress gotta get better first." Jey smiled to him.

Suddenly a squeak, as the hinges of the hospital room door open to the familiar Nurse Nikki and Dr. Shawn Michaels. _They need to do something about that door._

Dr. Michaels pulled some forms from a clipboard he was carrying. "Oh Nurse Cross, take these to Dr. Helmsley back down in the lab, I'll handle everything from here."

"Yes Dr. Michaels." Nurse Cross replied sweetly with her Scottish accent dripping through her words before rushing outside.

The doctor's arrival providing a small blessing, distracting the three from the growing tension over their missing family member. 

"Dr. Michaels." Roman spoke fondly.

"Please call me Shawn, Mr. Anoa'i." Shawn answered cheekily. "You've been my patient for years, I'd have thought that at this point we've gotten to know each other on a first name basis. Don't get formal with me now." Shawn laughed.

Roman smiled, Shawn had always been a warm doctor with him but the memory of their first meeting was bittersweet as Dean was the one who helped him choose his hematologist-oncologist. 

"We have some good news Roman, from your most recent lumbar puncture test, it seems like you're entering remission. Your white blood cell count is a little low, but from the bone marrow samples we've gathered your white blood cells are appearing healthy and steadily rising. You're recovering surprisingly fast from the bone marrow transplant and we may be able to discharge you soon."

"Remission," Roman paused in thought, "that's great news doc, any reason why I feel so weak?"

"Likely from the allograft, plus you've been in a coma for around 4 days now. We're not sure why, and we'd like to keep you under surveillance a bit longer because of it but if all is well, you could go home before the end of the week." Shawn chimed. 

Roman frowned at that, it's not normal to go into a coma after surgery.

"That's great news uce! You can go home soon." Jimmy shouted. 

Roman smiled but couldn't remove his growing apprehension. "Was Dean around?"

"Your husband was here around the time you had the allograft. Wouldn't leave your side all night. Haven't seen him since. I'd have hoped he'd show up today." Dr. Michaels lamentes. 

_Even Shawn is concerned. I need to do something._

"Jey, can I use your phone, I think I may need to make a few calls." Roman asks, taking initative for the plan forming within his mind. 

"Sure, but no use in stressing yourself out uce." Jey responds before passing his iphone to his cousin. 

Roman wasn't sure what to think about the recent news as concern on Dean's whereabouts stuck at the forefront of his mind. Some of the best news of his life and his husband wasn't around to hear it. Regardless of his inner turmoil Roman had always been a man of action, always leaping before looking, with Jey's cellphone in hand Roman dials.

◇◇◇◇◇

Within a day of awakening Roman files a missing person's report, within two days he hires a private investigator. At three days after awakening, Roman finally returns home. It's Sunday and still no signs of Dean.

Along the winding road home, Roman gazes upon the sky, a sunset harkening the dark moonless night, cloud cover keeping stars away. Perfectly reflecting the mood within his heart.

Nia's Mercedes' air conditioning cools his skin as the mild chatter between his cousins Nia and Jey fill his ears. Roman hears but doesn't listen, he doesn't want to think or his mind will gravitate towards his missing husband again.

"Roman, we'll find him." Nia chimes, sensing Roman's distress.

Roman responds with a grunt of acknowledgement. _Where's Dean?_ The aggressive thought within his mind, the question they were all trying to answer.

Long past the coastal strip stands a familiar path in front of him, one he'd driven along multiple times, one which makes his heart ache. They would arrive to his home soon, _Our home Dean._

The car stops and nothing looks amiss their classic two story home with a southern flair. Upkept lawn and sturdy lemon tree welcoming him back, dark blue door complimenting the off-pearl paint personifying the inviting charm of suburbia. 

Inside his home felt eerie, unchanged from when he left it. Dean's large jean jacket hanging besides the front door, _he'd have taken this with him wouldn't he?_

Neat and orderly just as Dean would leave it. Dean always hated clutter. 

They helped him upstairs to his room his spine mildly tender from his time in the hospital. As they reached the door of his bedroom Roman braced himself for the unknown before turning the handle.

His bed was disheveled and unmade, just as Dean would normally leave it. His hands brush alongside the sheets, cold as if any heat within them had long since dissipated. Roman's cellphone lay on the nightstand, forgotten and uncharged. Roman's eyes wander towards the sliding panel besides the nightstand. He reaches towards the handle of the sliding closet panel, his hands stopping with apprehension of what his closet room door would reveal. With trepidation, he slides it open. 

All of Dean's clothes were right where Dean would normally leave them. No signs of packing, Dean's possessions sat firmly where they belonged. Their room unchanged from when he last left it, everything in its right place.

Roman paces towards his bathroom eyes transfixing on the bathroom mirror._ I look_ _tired._ His eyes shift downward to the silver toothbrush holder, two brushes. Dean's toothbrush right next to his confirming Roman's suspicion that his husband had no intentions on leaving. 

Unable to hold back incoming tears, Roman lets himself cry.

◇◇◇◇◇

The days felt longer, seconds blurring into minutes blurring into hours as if he were trapped in a dissociative nightmare of reality. The concept of time alluding him only the rotation of his family providing an indication of the shifting days, Nia, Jimmy, Naomi, and Jey repeat. He could understand their love, it's what kept him going, he knew they didn't want him to overly stress himself, in fear it would take him out of remission, in fear he would never fully heal. 

These past days his phone became his constant companion, never out of reach awaiting any potential details authorities could muster. Fixating on it would do him no good and figuring some fresh air would calm his nerves, Roman went to his backyard for some star gazing.

The wooden rocking chair stood invitingly, its sturdy oak wood in place with the bayou charm of his backyard where his _their_ home borders the outskirts of untamed parkland. Roman reclines on his rocking chair atop the veranda, as memories of Dean flood his mind.

The first day he brought Dean here to their new home after having moved from their apartment in Tampa Bay. A new home away from the turmoil of citylife where they hoped to someday adopt children together. Roman fell in love with the place and Dean added his own esoteric flair into its decor. Giving their home an old western feel of all things. 

But long before that they'd met when Roman was in university back in Atlanta. Roman had a particularly bad leg injury from football that sidelined him for awhile and added to the many injuries that would eventually signal the end of Roman's football career. Roman was secretly thankful for it as it brought him to the beginning of the rest of his life, Dean Ambrose.

Dean Ambrose, the once Brazilian jiu jitsu prodigy turned physical therapist. Roman thought it was a strange pivot in occupational choice but beautiful sweet Dean admitted he wanted to be the one helping people, he'd seen enough violence growing up in Cincinnati that through therapy he could help victims of assault or beyond their prime athletes like his uncle Mark who'd still do wrestling gigs despite being way over the hill. They could never finish the Mickey Rourke movie the Wrestler without tears in Dean's eyes having lived watching his uncles waste themselves away in a ring and losing some of his relatives to painkiller addictions. 

The thing was medical knowledge never stuck with Dean but anatomy… body that made sense to him. That Dean understood in spades. When Roman would say there's a weird stinging feeling in his knee Dean would know what it meant, what might be torn, what might be stressed. Sometimes even with just a look Dean could recognize what was wrong with someone. The level of insight that man had was almost supernatural. 

Dean was always gentle with him too. It took Roman months to get the courage to ask him out only to be rejected on the basis of "patient confidentiality." Despite that Roman persisted, continuing after his rehab was done, until Dean gave in for a single date. Then like a domino effect, that one date turned into two, three, four, and eventually two years later, a small spontaneous wedding in Las Vegas with Jey as the witness. Dean had always been whimsical, someone who could make the most bizarre seem romantic. Someone who could make the tackiest chapel in Las Vegas seem more beautiful than Paris. It must have been Dean's smile, those dimples could make angels fall from the heavens, probably. 

The cool Pensacola air calms his nagging fears, soothes his rising anxiety as he vocalizes the prevailing thought. The thought that strengthens his resolve, pushing him to carry forward and recover ever since he awoke from that cold hospital bed. A promise he vowes to fulfill. 

"I'll find you Dean, no matter what I will find you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've never been to Florida, but I can read a map and google search. Also should've made Jay White the nurse, lost opportunity.


	3. When no one hears your prayers

< 4 months before >

Green armchairs align the blue walled waiting room, a TV airing daytime trash TV offers him the soothing sounds of Maury Povich and angry paternity test seeking women. A digital alarm clock above the receptionist desk catches his attention. Red numbers stagnant, each minute elongating as the hospital waiting room becomes ever more constricting. It was maddening, he needed to get away, get some fresh air. Sitting still was never easy for him and the book he brought didn't seem appealing nor did playing something on his phone.He needed a break from the wait, from the distress of watching the love of his life waste away. 

With urgency Dean Ambrose stood up from his seafoam green chair eagerly approaching the receptionist desk where a dark skinned woman with bizarre contacts resided. _ Is she some kind of cat person or just eccentric? Whatever it ain't my place to pry. _

His raspy voice further chafed from his dry lips calls for her attention, "Miss…" Dean pauses to look at her nametag. "Moon, I'm gonna go out for a walk, call this number when patient Leati Roman Joseph Anoa'i is ready." Dean says before scribbling away on a business card from the stash next to the pen attached to her reception desk. 

"Let me check his status first." She looked back at her computer to type away. "Seems like he's currently in OR, it might take a few hours. We will make sure to call you when he's finished."

Dean nodded and left. 

Outside, he took a moment to appreciate the portion of the hospital. This clinic portion was smaller, intimate, highly specialized, and Dean liked it that way, sure it was a two hour drive to Panama City but he couldn't complain as there were few specialists better in leukemia research than Dr. Shawn Micheals and Dr. Helmsley. In Dean's eyes, it was a lucky break they'd settled nearby. All he could do now was trust that everything would go well. 

Dean turns towards the streets outside the hospital area, his wandering feet navigating him through the quiet suburban streets. Aimlessly, he continues forward as the autumn air kissing his face sending shivers through his body. 

_ It's never as cold in this part of the country as back in Cincinnati but, all the same whenever weather changes, it still hits you. _

In response to the chill, Dean pops up the collar of his brown leather jacket while the November air before continues forward, losing track of time before he finds himself confronting a large building standing in contrast with the various houses ever present in suburbia, a church. 

Stained glass windows entrance his eyes, a kaleidoscope of dancing colorful diamond patterns surround religious figures. A strange opulence that clashes with the humble blue and white church. Cold air blasts through his hair, the wind signaling the encroaching winter as the chill of late November snaps him out of his stupor coaxing him forward. 

The doors were open, patrons had modestly filled the adjacent parking lot. The rumbling of voices indicating the start of a busy sermon. With curiosity Dean saunters forward, carrying his frigid form into the church as the sounds of an afternoon sermon grow louder with each step. He finds a place to sit nearer to the back, the warmth inside furthering his awareness of the frigidity of his fingers.

Dean Ambrose was not a religious man, yet he found himself here. Sitting in the back of the church sitting on a hard uncomfortable bench waiting for the sermon to end, listening half heartedly to the booming voice of the pastor ahead.  
  
Dean's kind were rarely welcome to these places, but that was generations ago when brothers and sisters were burned in misguided accusations. Also he was gay and that didn't do him any favors in most places. But here he was, searching for answers that the earth itself couldn't give him. Help that maybe a higher power could pull him through.

An inflection brimming with power and grandiose words spun with determination. Dean allowed himself to be captivated by the man's voice even though he couldn't comprehend what the hell the man was saying. The pastor's words ooze passion and vigor. It was useless drivel to him, something about God's love and whatnot, but he wouldn't deny the sermon was engaging its patrons.

Dean allowed himself to be lulled by the man's words sitting there in quiet contemplation long until after the sermon ended, where the patrons dispersed, leaving to return to their everyday lives. Dean found himself unwilling to leave, not sure what to do, what answers he meant to find. _ Why did I come here? How can I expect anything from coming here? _

Dean sat still lost in observation as the large pastor with a booming voice approached him and taking the seat next to Dean. The guy was well built, thick and stocky but with the strength of an athlete rather than one Dean would consider obese. 

"You came to speak with me my son? I see you have not left and appear apprehensive to approach me." 

Dean was caught off guard by the statement. "No… I'm… I'm… I don't know why I'm still here. I should … go” Tears accumulate along Dean's eyes. Dean rose attempting to leave but instead slipping back onto the bench, legs feeling like jelly giving out to his escalating emotional state. 

A heavy hand rubs circles along Dean’s shoulders in a gesture of compassion as Dean whimpers, any attempt to hold back his sobs failing. 

"Oh young one, do not fear your tears for did not the son weep for his father? For the son loved him. Do not be ashamed for even a being as holy as Jesus Christ and as wicked as Lucifer would weep." 

Dean was confused, "Why bring up Lucifer? Why would he cry?"

“Because God asked the angels to serve mankind and he could not accept his father's role as being usurped. For his fall was not of arrogance but of rage that no being should be seen above his father, their father. For what are we but mortal men, how dare we usurp that which gives us grace." The holy man pauses before continuing, "But today, for many, God is dead for we have killed him."

Dean snorted, eyes narrowing with suspicion, "Strange for a priest of all people to say."

"It's from Nietzsche. In my perspective, it does not negate God itself but speaks of our perception of God. The way people worship and dedicate themselves. We no longer revere him as we used to. " The pastor's eyes sparkled with what Dean would describe a condescending annoyance found in people who thought they knew better. 

Dean found himself annoyed, having trouble deciphering the man's intentions. “So why be a priest if you don't think there's a God? Why are you even telling me this stuff?” 

"There's an intangible more, as we are but creation's servants. I believe in a divine creator but our human books are only a guess to what it may be. And I tell you because you need to know." The man said with an unnerving unrelenting sincerity that caught Dean off guard.

"I don't understand. What do you mean by creation's servants? What the hell do I need to know?" Dean asked aloud. 

"We live freely, as freely as we can. But wherever more we are chained, slaves to something or another, whether it be a vice or the struggle to survive. And I tell you because I am the same as you, there's no need for those like us to fear the divine." The pastor added.

Blue eyes shone with shock, but Dean understood the man he was speaking to wasn't an enemy. Something within himself urged Dean to hear the man out.

The pastor's dark eyes bore into Dean as if they'd read into his soul. A gaze that bore through Dean as if he were a text to be studied. "Tell me, what is it that hurts your soul in such a way?" 

Dean saw no use hiding his feelings if the priest was going to pry and found himself confessing, "I hate that I can't drag it out of him you know? So I can punch the cancer away." Dean pauses before the agonizing question that confounds his mind is given breath, with a soft voice it escapes,"Why him?"

Dean instantly regrets those words expecting to be comforted with words of God's master plan of some greater good. As if some divine force had a master plan to take his loved ones away. To take Roman and strip away the joy in Dean's world, the guiding light in his life, the man who pushed him to keep going when he was ready to quit. The man who held his hand through his mother's funeral when even his own little sister never showed up. 

The pastor gave Dean a sympathetic look, "The world isn't fair, but I may know someone who can help you. A broker if you will. Only one who arranges with the otherness of this world."

_ Wait… what? _

Dean found himself dumbfounded at the pastors words, holding the black card as the priest handing it to Dean. An old forgotten fear resurfaced within Dean's mind, a fear from long forgotten cautionary tales he'd heard in his youth, "Why would a priest talk to demons?"

"Why would a witch go to church?" The pastor responded coyly.

Dean flares at the accusation. 

Sensing Dean's discomfort the holy man quickly describes, "I'm a man of action, dealing with all that is holy and unholy. We're born with our gifts, I believe God gave them to us for a reason but like so many others we will be tested. You see like you, I possess a sight, prophetic dreams, warnings. It is in their interests our world remains stable as our worlds are tied, but make no mistake they will ask for a heavy price."

Dean focuses on the priest, for once truly eyeing him. There was no spike in energy, no lie hidden beneath. For how useless his magic could be, it kept him safe letting him see the truth behind the lies, reading others' emotions, and visualizing weaknesses. He had been misdiagnosed with synesthesia when he was a kid but he knew better. Whatever he saw was beyond some weird sensory input miswiring. His mother thought for all their science, doctors didn’t know shit about dealing with magic. She wasn’t wrong. Keeping his mouth shut about it was for the best, even from Roman. 

"So you're like me, why work in a church?" Dean refutes confusionedly.

"Why not?" The pastor responds in a matter-of-fact way, "Where else do people go at their lowest and what better place to hide than plain sight?"

Sniffling, Dean continued, "So I'm just supposed to believe some demons can fix him. Sell my soul for shit I don't know would even work. What do you gain from this?"

In a slow timber the man replies, "Nothing."

"Liar." Dean snorts, "No one does anything for free."

The pastor smirks, "I help them do business but what I'd gain from sending you to them, nothing. I see a tortured soul in the house of the Lord and give him a means to solve his problems. Would you have come if you weren't desperate?"

Dean's anger rises, Dean hadn't dealt with demons before, hadn't encountered any directly, his uncle Mark telling him to steer clear of them as they always looked to barter for a witch's power, something they could never physically hold in our world.

"How far in?" The holy man asks.

"Far. Not the worst case yet but far." Dean stammered. 

Slyly, the pastor added, "What do you have to lose?" 

_ Everything. _Dean thought. 

The holy man interrupted Dean's thoughts, "Keep the card, you may need it Mr.-"

"Dean. Dean Ambrose."

"Ambrose, that's a powerful name." The man looked at him with a coy interest, his right eyebrow raised in amusement. It sickened Dean.

"It don't mean nothing these days." Dean threw back at him angrily. " You know, it's only fair I hear your name as well Mr.-?"

The pastor grunted before continuing, "Joe. Just Joe or Pastor Seanoa if you prefer." 

Dean expected that grin on Joe's face to be a sign of something sinister but for now Dean kept the black business card and put it in his wallet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long delay, the next chapter won't take as long to post.


End file.
